Stocking foot



Sept. 7, 1937. E, JRUCKEL 2,092,616

STOGKING` FOOT Filed. Dec 1, 1935 mvi'tvvm :uit l `N wotmkmmtst Mmmm Patented Sept. 7, 1937 UNITED Vsfmrrss STOCKING FOOT lErwin Ruckel, Richmondv Hill, N. Y., assignor to lLouis yHirsch Textile Machines, Inc., New York, N. Y., a. corporation of New York Application December 1%]1936, Serial No. lll3,585

3 Claims.

This invention relates to a new and useful improvement of fabric of which the foot of a full fashioned stocking is composed. The usual construction of such a stocking foot consists of an unreenforced instep portion and a fully reenforced sole portion. The reenforcement of the sole -is to provide wearing qualities but in this it is not 4entirely effective because the reenforcing practically eliminates elasticity from the sole.

The sole may be -quite resistant to abrasive wear but its lack of elasticity definitely fixes the length of the foot at a given size so that if it happens to be a little short it is bound to be uncomfortable and almost certain to be cut by l5 the toe nail. The lack of elasticity also greatly reduces the amount of circumferential stretch throwing all of the strain upon the unreenforced and relatively weak instep portion which is rigidly anchored at the edge of the inelastic reenforced sole so that a given stocking is limited not only to a given length but to substantially a given instep size.

The relative length and instep size of feet vary greatly so that a really complete line of hosiery of the usual construction should contain not only a lnumber of diiferent foot lengths in half sizes but several instep sizes as well for each foot length. All of this when added to the great variation in welt and leg sizes presents no so small problem to the manufacturer, seller and purchaser.

These diiliculties are greatly minimized by the present invention, one form of which is shown in the accompanying drawing, of which Figure 1 is a general view of a completed stocking foot embodying the invention; and

Fig. 2 is a greatly enlarged diagrammatic view of a fragment of the sole fabric and adjacent instep fabric.

- As shown the sole portion I, instead of being fully reenforced in the Acustomary manner, is only partially reenforced. That is to say, two courses such as 2 and 3 are reenforced, the two following courses 4 and 5 are unreenforced, the.

two following courses 6 and 1 are reenforced Aand so on throughout the sole portion or any desired .part thereof. The length of the loops in all courses of the sole portion are preferably somewhat longer than those of the instep portion 9 for two reasons-'to provide the necessary room for the two yarns of the reenforced courses and also to provide greater elasticity and flexibility in the sole portion. These longer loops have been indicated in Fig. 2 by wavy lines. A stocking sole constructed in this way is exceedingly elastic,

`enforced, and so on.

particularly circumferentially. It is thus able to adapt itself to practically any instep heighth. It is also extremely flexible due primarily to the unreenforced courses interposed between the y reenforced courses which permit the fabric to adapt itself readily to various foot contours and to strains more or less diagonal to the direction of the courses. The flexibility and elasticity of the sole fabric acts as an effective shock absorber to the strains upon the instep portion and the rigidity of the anchorage of the instep loops to the sole is effectively eliminated by the same characteristics and also by the fact that half or at least a large number of the points of anchorage are to unreenforced sole courses so that 15 in these the instep fabric continues, in effect, all the way around the foot.

Although the sole constructionof the invention has been illustrated and described as consisting of alternate reenforced and unreenforced 20 courses it will be understood, of course, that this arrangement may be varied, as many courses of each sort being used as desired; for instance, four reenforced followed by two or four unre- 25 It is suggested that the construction be limited to an even number of courses of each kind so that the reenforcing yarn 'may be carried across the unreenforced courses at the edges of the fabric las'shown at 8 in Fig. 2, since it will then 30 be included in the seam. The character of flat knitting machines is such that if an odd number ofcourses were adopted it is obvious that the reenforcing yarn would have to be carried from the inner endof the last reenforced course diag- 35 onally across the unreenforced courses to the outer end of the next reenforced courseso that there will be a large number of highly undesirable oats of substantial length.

The foot construction of this invention makes ,4,0 possible the elimination of half sizes in foot length since the stretching of the instep portion by a high instep foot will be communicated to the sole portion and the distortion of the loops thereof will shorten the foot length. Therefore, 45 by'a judicious selection of foot length in relation to instep height, a stocking having an extremely good fit in all respects can be obtained without the need of half sizes or of a number of instep sizes for each foot length. Also, as already stated, 50 the elasticity and flexibility of the fabric adapts itto the varying contour of the foot Very successfully thus eliminating Wrinkles and excessive strains as well as distributing more evenly and over larger areas the strains which occur. y

The fabric construction of .this invention need not be limited to the sole. It may well be used `in the heel Il, for example, where a maximum of elasticity and iexlbility is highly desirable, or in fact in any portion in which reenforcement is required.

What I claim is:

1. A full fashioned flat knit stocking foot consisting of an unreenforced instep portion, and a sole portion the courses of which are composed of groups of reenforced courses alternating with groups of unreenforced courses, the loops of both the reenforced and unreenforced courses of the sole being longerthan the loops of the instep portion.

2. A full fashioned, at knit stocking foot consisting of an unreenforced instep portion, and a. sole portion the courses of which are composed of groups of an even number of reenforced courses alternating with groups of an even number of unreenforced courses, the loops of both the reenforced and unreenforced courses of the sole being longer than the loops of the instep portion.

3. 'I'he method of knitting a full fashioned, flat knit stocking foot which consists of forming an even number of consecutive courses in the instep and sole portions each of which is composed of loops of normal length in the instep portion and longer loops in the sole portion, simultaneously reenforcing the sole portion of each course, then forming an even number of consecutive courses of similar loops without reenforcement and then repeating the course cycle as many times as desired.

ERWIN RUCKEL. 

